Every year I try but fail to capture via photos the crazy amount of pollinator activity on my ‘Millenium’ Alliums.
You can even hear a constant hum when you stand near the flowers.
Butterflies, bees, beetles and wasps love these flowers that bloom for a couple of weeks in August each summer. This year I even noticed some Potter Wasps paying a visit. It worried me a little since they have a very nasty sting. There’s probably a nest of them in the area, but thankfully it’s usually in a tree or someplace higher (unlike like Yellow Jackets that hide out in wood piles or even holes in the ground and can pounce on a weeding gardener without notice).
For kicks when I was watering some of my plants recently, I sprayed the alliums to see how many pollinators would take flight. It was impressive—easily hundreds! Of course then some of them were agitated and let me know by buzzing around my head.
Allium ‘Millenium’ grows 15 to 20 inches tall in full or part-sun. Despite the fact that it’s supposedly hardy to only Zone 5, I have never lost a plant over the winter. I even have plants growing in a north-facing exposed wall where I’ve tried to plant dozens of different kinds of perennials over the years only to discover them “missing” after a tough winter.